My Take Radio

In sea­son 9 of Smal­l­ville we saw the unof­fi­cial for­ma­tion of the Jus­tice League (again) after the old Jus­tice Soci­ety kicked the crap out of them (mainly Hawk­man) and then helped them stop a major threat. Kryptonsite.com has con­firmed that the show is going to con­tinue to intro­duce new char­ac­ters, with at least one hav­ing no place on the show whatsoever.

I am refer­ring to Dead­shot, one of the great­est snipers/assassins in the DC uni­verse. Why does he not belong? One word – BATMAN. Dead­shot is a Bat­man vil­lain and Smal­l­ville has already failed to show the great­est super­hero team up of all time for nine years; that of Bat­man & Super­man or at least hav­ing Bruce Wayne meet Clark Kent. I guess they should get con­sis­tency points for con­tin­ued fail­ure since sea­son three. To make mat­ters worse, Dark­seid will appear this sea­son – most likely he will be the big vil­lain of the sea­son but with no actual “Super­man” on the show, how is that sen­si­ble? And how is this low bud­get show going to pull off Boom Tubes, Kalibak or any of the other inhab­i­tants of Apokolips?

OK, rant over, let’s focus on some appear­ances that make sense. Hawk­girl will appear but it is not clear if she will be a present char­ac­ter or a flash­back one since Hawk­man said she died years ago. Hawk­man returns this sea­son and with him he will bring the likes of Booster Gold and the Blue Bee­tle. Booster Gold is per­fect for clos­ing out this show because his per­sona is utterly ridiculous…just as Smal­l­ville has become.

After weeks of story bits, some pho­tos and a few not-so reveal­ing pro­mos, we finally got to watch Smallville’s two hour Absolute Jus­tice episode. Here’s the recap.

We start off the episode with a bad­die pick­ing off old mem­bers of Jus­tice Soci­ety of Amer­ica.  We see Chloe walk­ing out­side, leav­ing Clark a voice­mail, when sud­denly all the power in the area goes out. Chloe looks around and sees some­thing glow­ing with elec­tric­ity. Run­ning over (because why would you run the other way), she finds a man wield­ing an energy rod. He intro­duces him­self as Sylvester Pem­ber­ton (hello Star-Spangled Kid) and says that they’re both try­ing to put a team together. He knows all about Watch­tower and notes that his friends did some­thing like it first. While talk­ing, Pem­ber­ton spidey-senses some­thing bad and throws Chloe into a dump­ster. He is attacked and ends up killed by some­one that can shoot giant icicles.  At the hos­pi­tal, Clark meets a heart­bro­ken Court­ney Whit­more (aka Star­girl). See­ing his press pass, she refuses to speak to him as he tries to help her. 

Never the one to not be a super sleuth,Chloe embarks on the path to dig­ging up the truth about Pem­ber­ton, who, accord­ing to his arrest records that Clark later gets a hold of, was part of a gang of crim­i­nals. (We find out via an old high­light reel of footage these 12 peo­ple really didn’t do “crim­i­nal” things). Chloe had got­ten a hold of  Pemberton’s cell­phone call log at the hos­pi­tal, and they decide after see­ing the footage and review­ing the log that they need to find a man named Wes­ley Dodds (aka Sand­man). As it goes, by the time Clark gets to his home, dear Sand­man is all holey and cold, and there is the “JSA” moniker scrawled  in his blood nearby. Hmmmm, what the hell does JSA mean?? Nobody knows — but they will find out.  

Mean­while, Chloe and Oliver have tracked down one of the remain­ing crim­i­nals, Carter Hall (Hawk­man). Clark goes to visit Hall, and we find out he is the keeper of a shut-down museum whose con­tents are bathed in sheets.  We also find out he keeps a close eye on a crazy, men­tally nutso Dr. Kent Nel­son (Dr. Fate), (For obser­va­tional pur­poses, let’s point out he keeps the Nabu mask in a bowl­ing bag. I don’t know if this is always the case, but it’s odd.) Hall denies talk­ing to either of the dead men, and says he refused Pemberton’s calls. Clark uses his x-ray vision on said bowl­ing bag and sees a golden hel­met inside. It turns on its own and faces Clark — eek. Carter tells Clark they have noth­ing more to say and Clark leaves. Once he’s gone, Nel­son tells Carter that the voices want to help, but Carter says that they’ll have to help them­selves. He clearly doesn’t want to be a hero again.

Oliver dis­cov­ers that Pemberton’s energy rod is miss­ing. He spots Court­ney walk­ing down the street, car­ry­ing the rod. He approaches her and wants the rod. She points it at him, but Oliver remonds her that two men have died and demands some answers. Nelson arrives out of nowhere and trig­gers the rod, say­ing they help them­selves. Bam! Nel­son and Court­ney have disappeared.

Oliver gets Chloe and they track down Pemberton’s car from the park­ing tick­ets filed against it (that darn Chloe is crafty). Inside the old car, we see it is labeled “Star Rocket Racer.” They find his jour­nal, which has intel on all of their real iden­ti­ties. Chloe fig­ures that Court­ney knows who they are as well. Back at the museum, we see Carter, Nel­son and Courtney. Stargirl insists that they know who the killer is, and that they have to do some­thing.  Dodds and Pem­ber­ton are dead, and Carter needs to stop being emo and lead them again. She says she will  go to another team if she has to, but Carter calls them ama­teurs. As Carter walks away, Court­ney asks him what Shiera (his wife) would have done, which causes Carter to stop and think for a minute. He then reveals his funny Hawk­man cos­tume and mace, and goads Nel­son into putting on the Nabu mask once again. This cre­ates Dr. Fate’s insta-costume. I think Dr. Fate looked the best out of all of them.  

Dr. Fate tracks down Chloe and Clark at the hos­pi­tal morgue, where they are check­ing out the frost-bitten body of Sand­man. Dr. Fate tells Chloe that her fate is much like his own. Huh? Like Dr. Fate, Chloe can see what every­one else is doing (as Watch­tower, any­way) but her own fate, like his, is obscured. When Dr. Fate looks at Clark, he sees the Super­man cape. (Woohoo!)  He superhero-travels Clark  back to the museum. When he comes to, Clark uncov­ers all the dis­plays, reveal­ing a that the museum was a front for the JSA Head­quar­ters. It is  filled with weapons, trin­kets, and cos­tumes. Show­cases hold things like box­ing gloves, a green lantern, a hel­met with the wings of Mer­cury, a belt marked “Fair Play,” an hour­glass, and var­i­ous weaponry. Another case holds a woman’s hawk mask, cracked on the top. Clark rec­og­nizes the Last Sup­per por­trait as the peo­ple in the files/reel he had looked at. Wow — these were not crim­i­nals, but heroes who were arrested and dis­cred­ited in the pub­lic eye long  ago!! GASP!

Whils Clark is pok­ing around, in flies Hawk­man. Doc Fate and Star­girl   arrive next, and Dr. Fate says that Clark is very impor­tant, and dif­fer­ent from the oth­ers. Hawk­man doesn’t under­stand why. Star­girl explains that the Star Span­gled Kid wanted to bring together the old and new heroes into a new team. Awkward ten­sion. Green Arrow arrives, fir­ing an arrow into the por­trait of the JSA. Green Arrow says that the JSA are noth­ing but crim­i­nals. He and Christian-Bale Batman-voiced Hawk­man are imme­di­ately at each other’s throats, and (yay) John Jones arrives and asks for every­one to work together peacefully. Clark warns that they’re not going any­where as long as there is a killer on the loose.

Oh yeah - back to that killer-at-large. We find out that our frost­bit­ten cul­prit is Cameron Mahkent, son of the comatose Joar Mahkent, known as Icicle. This whiney kid wants revenge because the JSA is respon­si­ble for his father’s condition. He has been recruited by Agent Amanda Waller — of an orga­ni­za­tion known as “Check­mate”. She’s the one who’s hunt­ing down the for­mer JSA mem­bers and using this dope as her pawn.

We also finally see Lois, who receives a pack­age con­tain­ing all the JSA’s crim­i­nal records, with a note that reads “The truth shall set you free.” (Note: Tess Mer­cer is also inter­ested in this package.)

Back at the museum, Dr. Fate talks with Clark and explains that he sees everyone’s fate except for his own, and that see­ing Clark’s future has given him hope. Clark will lead the new gen­er­a­tion of heroes, like Hawk­man led the JSA. When Clark notes that the Legion spoke sim­i­larly about his fate, Dr. Fate gives him some specifics and says he will one day tri­umph over Lex Luthor (wait — isn’t he dead?) He says Clark will help every­one embrace a new age. Lois then arrives at the museum, Clark runs away, and Dr. Fate lets her in. He greets her and Lois says that she’s look­ing for Carter Hall. He tells her that he knows her fate.  He blabs about her being impor­tant to the “sav­ior” and “the sen­tient power.” They will need each other.  Okay, fine.

Look­ing for Ici­cle, John and Dr. Fate check out a nitro­gen stor­age facil­ity, since, after all that murder, the lit­tle cold bas­tard need to replen­ish his A/C reserve. When they sense him near, Fate sends John out into the abyss, reveal­ing for a split sec­ond his true green Man­hunter form. This also gives John his pow­ers back. Sur­prise, sur­prise — Ici­cle then kills Dr. Fate, and takes the glo­den hel­met. Wow, the JSA are drop­ping like flies huh?

Back at The Daily Planet, Lois is going through old files. Amanda Waller comes up behind her and says that they’re clas­si­fied files, and she left them for Lois. Lois won­ders why she was cho­sen, and Waller says that Lois is good at being nosy and “embrac­ing the truth”. She hands Lois a fancy-schmancy cell phone with a chess motif and says that they’ll be in touch.  We also see that Waller also has some kind of his­tory with Tess, as we see a  sign of“Checkmate”- a White Queen chess piece - left on Tess’s desk. Ooooooo foreshadowy.

Ici­cle goes to see his comatose father and says that Doc Fate’s hel­met will help him fin­ish off the other heroes. He then takes his father’s hand, says that he’s ready, and then pulls the plug on his father’s res­pi­ra­tor. Nice. Ici­cle jerkoff puts on the hel­met, which glows red. Uh-oh.

Heart­felt con­ver­sa­tion between Green Arrow and Hawk­man about his wife, con­nec­tions, love, friends, etc. They fly to the Watch­tower where Chloe is, and in comes Clark and Star­girl. Blah blah blah — here is Ici­cle — ready to deep freeze every­one. Here comes the fight we have been wait­ing 2 hours and 35 min­utes for. Icicle sus­pends Chloe within a choke-slamy ice field. All our heroes attack in a semi-cool bar­rage of comic fight­ing skills, but Fate’s hel­met pro­tects the blue shit­bag against the brunt of them. Hawk­man knocks him down, but Ici­cle throws out a blast that sends the good guys fly­ing. F-A-I-L.  He faces off with Star­girl, but Man­hunter saves her by deflect­ing the next ice blast using his recov­ered pow­ers. The heroes close in and Hawk­man smashes the hel­met loose with his mace, and we see him lay­ing on the floor like there should be a chalk out­line around him. Kind of a lame-o fin­ish to the fight.

We then have all the heart-t0-heart talks at the end of the episode, which I really don’t care too much about. Yada. Yada. Yada. Clark should trust his team, they will make mis­takes, keep try­ing. He does say that if Clark over­comes his own chains, he’ll soar higher than any of them. (Yes Clark — can you just fly already!!!)  Chloe, Man­hunter and Oliver have a cute family-type moment and go out for dinner.

Back at the Planet, another cute Lois-Clark moment where Lois tells Clark about her con­ver­sa­tion with Dr. Fate. Clark asks if she believes in fate, and Lois says she believes in the fate you make hap­pen. Nice.

Waller has some­how got­ten Ici­cle, who is now holed up in a heated room. That must hurt. Con­ver­sa­tion ensues, and she thanks him for bring­ing the JSA back into the spot­light. Waller tells him that he’s done what she needed him to do, as she’ll need the assem­bled heroes to sur­vive the com­ing apoc­olypse (or should I write Apokolips.…Darkseid fore­shad­ow­ing maybe? Just throw­ing it out there). Waller then shoots him dead, say­ing “Wel­come to the Sui­cide Squad”.  As she leaves the room, we see none other than Tess Mer­cer — in a suit bear­ing a ID tag  much like Waller’s. Hello, Agent Mer­cer. Hmmm.…..

All in all, Absolute Jus­tice was a nice way of bring­ing every­one together. I found it a lit­tle long, maybe since I am used to 44 min­utes at a time. The cos­tumes were a lit­tle campy, as was Hawkman’s fly­ing. I did enjoy the ban­ter between Hawk­man and Green Arrow though. Stargirl’s mask was ter­ri­ble - it looked like play­dough stuck to her face.

Good news though: “Absolute Jus­tice” attracted almost 2.8 mil­lion view­ers, Smallville’s largest audi­ence of the sea­son. It also gave The CW its best Fri­day night in more than a year.

What do you guys think? Was this worth such a long “movie”? Leave com­ments below…

As MTR’s res­i­dent TV won­der­girl, I have been keep­ing you all up to date on the fastly approach­ing Smal­l­ville movie event. Today, I have a new trailer for you, which brings back J’onn J’onzz (Mar­t­ian Man­hunter) and Green Arrow, and fea­tures Hawk­man, Star­Girl and Doc­tor Fate.

Are you going to watch or set your DVR’s? Feast your eyes on the trailer and comment:

Being the TV lover that I am, I fig­ured I would share some of our favorite show’s mid-season return dates with you.

Thurs­day, Jan. 14
Com­mu­nity returns at 8PM on NBC — If you haven’t watched this com­edy star­ring Joel McHale of “The Soup”, I HIGHLY rec­om­mend it.
Fringe is back at 9PM on FOX

Sun­day, Jan. 17
The new show Human Tar­get pre­mieres at 8PM on FOX — This looks like a pretty cool show. I will def­i­nitely be check­ing it out.
24 has a 4-hour, 2-night pre­miere that starts at 9PM on FOX

Thurs­day, Jan. 21 is a big night for me per­son­ally — my DVR will be work­ing over­time:
New CW hit show The Vam­pire Diaries is back at 8PM — Not as much of a chick show as you may think — give it a try.
Both Super­nat­ural (CW) and The Office (NBC) return at 9PM
Burn Notice returns at 10PM on USA

Fri­day, Jan. 22nd
Smal­l­ville returns at 8PM on the CW (Also, the Absolute Jus­tice TV Movie is Feb­ru­ary 5th.)

Wednes­day, Jan. 27th
Psych is back at 10 PM on USA

Tues­day, Feb. 2nd
LOST comes back for it’s final sea­son on at 9PM on ABC

Thurs­day, March 18th
Flash­For­ward returns at 8 PM on ABC

Tues­day, March 30th
V finally returns at 10 PM on ABC — ABC had given us a few episodes to get into and then yanked it until March — bas­tards. Can’t wait to get back into it.

Also, per­haps of inter­est,  the Doll­house Series Finale is Jan­u­ary 22nd at 9PM on FOX — I never watched this show, but it had a cult fol­low­ing that said it was good. If you were a part of that cult, I am sure this date is of inter­est to you.

If there are any other shows you are inter­ested in know­ing about, please let me know and I will do my best to get you a date.

Slightly off topic, I have read that things are look­ing pos­i­tive for a 10th sea­son of Smal­l­ville as well as a 6th sea­son of Super­nat­ural. Let’s see how this pans out, but I would be happy for both.

We are fastly approach­ing Smallville’s two-part Jus­tice League episode enti­tled “Absolute Jus­tice”, and the pre­views are in full swing on The CW. Take a look at what’s in store for our favorite res­i­dents of Metropolis…

I, for one, am look­ing for­ward to see­ing how the Smal­l­ville writ­ers pull this off. Any­one else? Catch the “Absolute Jus­tice” episode on Fri­day, Feb­ru­ary 5, 2010, but don’t for­get, new episodes return prior to that on Jan­u­ary 22nd at 8 pm EST.

Some of you may have read my ear­lier post on Smallville’s upcom­ing 2-part Jus­tice League themed episode. Word is that this is no longer the case — the CW has decided to make it a 2 hour MOVIE!!! The title for the flick?? Smal­l­ville: Absolute Jus­tice. (It has a nice ring to it, huh?)

Addi­tion­ally, the movie will debut yet another char­ac­ter known in the DC Uni­verse — none other than Hawk­man (yay)!

The actor that has signed on to play Hawk­man is Michael Shanks — some of you may know him from Star­gate SG-1, but I know him from his 4-episode arc as Vic­tor on Burn Notice.  Check out the first pic­ture of our artificially-winged friend:

Nice pants guy…

FYI - The air­date for Smal­l­ville: Absolute Jus­tice has been changed from Jan­u­ary 29 , 2010 to Feb­ru­ary 5, 2010. (Boo.)  

Lastly, I have also read that Pam Grier will be join­ing for mul­ti­ple episodes play­ing the won­der­fully bad Amanda Waller. (Hmmm..not too sure about that.) Yummy tid­bit:  Waller was ranked as IGN’s 60th Great­est Comic Book Vil­lain of All Time in 2009. I’d say Grier has some cracked eggs to fill. What do you think??

Credit once again goes to Michael Ausiello for the scoops… http://ausiellofiles.ew.com

We all know the CW’s Smal­l­ville as a guilty plea­sure to many comic book fans (whether or not you want to admit to tun­ing in, I understand). As we wind down the ninth sea­son, (which is pos­si­bly the last, although I per­son­ally think it may go one more), I expect the sto­ry­lines to be kicked up a notch…more so than the “Dooms­day” episodes of last sea­son. I am sure all of you are eager to see “The Red/Blue Blur” stop being emo and start get­ting  “Super”.  (As do I — the  trench coat has got to go – give me some blue and red span­dex and a cape already!!)

Well, I read today about a two-part episode enti­tled “Soci­ety” slated to come our way in Jan­u­ary 2010. It is being writ­ten by comic book writer Geoff Johns. (Hmmm…you may know him from some guys called the Green Lantern and The Flash.) Johns is no stranger to Smal­l­ville - he also wrote Episode 8x11 called “Legion”, where he intro­duced us to Cos­mic Boy, Sat­urn Girl and Light­ning Lad from the Legion of Superheroes.  

I think I can speak for many when I say that we all look for­ward to new DC char­ac­ters drop­ping into Metrop­o­lis, so these two episodes are kind of important. Thus far, sea­son 9 has given us the likes of Major Zod, Met­allo and Roulette, and another appear­ance from the Toy­man. Now “Soci­ety” is going to mark the arrival of the Jus­tice Soci­ety - more specif­i­cally mem­bers Hawk­man, Doc­tor Fate, and Star­girl. Also, it has been revealed that they are bring­ing back a fan-fave char­ac­ter which you may remem­ber — J’onn J’onzz a/k/a the Mar­t­ian Man­hunter (played by actor Phil Mor­ris). We last saw the Man­hunter mak­ing the ulti­mate sac­ri­fice by fly­ing an injured Kal-El into the sun, giv­ing up his own pow­ers to restore Kal-El’s. I for one like the Man­hunter, and I hope we are going to see him in his true form at least once.

So the ques­tions — are you happy to see Mar­t­ian Man­hunter again? How about the arrival of the Jus­tice Soci­ety?? Do you feel that Smal­l­ville has done a good job of bring­ing the DC Comics to life on the small screen for the past nine sea­sons?? Sound off below.…and tune in for the “Soci­ety” episodes…I think it’s going to be good.

Credit for the scoop goes to http://ausiellofiles.ew.com/2009/10/26/smallville-scoop-martian-manhunter-returns/